Roush Fenway Racing Daytona 500 Advance

 Jerry Markland/Getty Images for NASCAR

The 2011 NASCAR season has begun, and Roush Fenway Racing returns to the high banks and newly repaved surface of Daytona International Speedway in hopes of starting the season off on the right foot. After an up and down 2010 season, the organization will look to 2011 to prove once again that they can be competitive and make a run for the Sprint Cup Series championship. 

  

Greg Biffle—No. 16 3M Ford

Biffle has 16 Cup starts at Daytona, eight of them being the Daytona 500. He has one win at Daytona, which was the summer race in 2003. In 2004, he started from the pole for the Daytona 500, and finished 12th. He has led a total of 58 laps at Daytona in his sixteen starts. Biffle has an average starting position of 19.2 and an average finish of 20.8  His best finish in the Daytona 500 was last year’s season opener where he finished 3rd.

Biffle’s paint 3M paint scheme has changed a bit from what we saw last season. The new paint scheme he will run this season was first run in the 2010 All-Star Race at Charlotte Motor Speedway, and the fans loved it so much that it became the primary paint scheme for the 2011 season.

Biffle starts 26th.

Carl Edwards—No. 99 Aflac Ford

The 2011 season opener will be Edwards’ 7th time running the Daytona 500 and his 13th time overall at Daytona. He has an average starting position of 17.6 with an average finish of 17.7. His best finish at Daytona was in the 2008 race in July where he finished 2nd. However, Edwards’ best finish in the Daytona 500 came last year when he finished 9th.

Edwards has three top-5 finishes and five top-10 finishes at Daytona. In his twelve previous starts at Daytona, he has only led three laps.  The No. 99 team will be running chassis RK-712, which is a brand new car.

Edwards starts 22nd.

Matt Kenseth—No. 17 Crown Royal Black Ford

Two years ago, Kenseth won a rain shortened Daytona 500, earning his first ever victory in the Great American Race. It was also Roush Fenway Racing’s first Daytona 500 victory. In his twenty-two overall starts at Daytona, Kenseth has led 69 laps, earned ten top-10 finishes, and had three top-5 finishes. His average start is 22.2 while his average finish is 17.3

The No. 17 team will be running chassis RK-713, a brand new car. Kenseth was able to race up front on Thursday during the first Gatorade Duel, and the team will work hard to repeat that performance for the 2011 Daytona 500.

Kenseth starts 9th.

David Ragan—No. 6 UPS Ford

2011 will mark Ragan’s fifth time running the Daytona 500, 9th race overall at the speedway. In his first attempt in 2007, he finished 5th, which is his career best finish in Daytona. Last year, he led two laps in the Daytona 500. Those are the only laps he’s ever led at the track.  His average start is 23.4, and his average finish is 17.1. He has two DNFs, the most recent occurring last July.

On Thursday, Ragan was involved in a wreck on the last lap of the second Gatorade Duel. The damage was too severe to fix and the No. 6 team was forced to unload the backup. Their backup car is chassis RK-723, which is also a brand new car. The chassis is one that Ragan ran in the test session at Daytona a few weeks ago.

Ragan starts 34th.